Mcdonald Case Study Essay Example for Free

Mcdonald Case Study Essay Mission Statement McDonald’s mission statement is: McDonalds vision is to be the worlds best quick service restaurant experience. Being the best means providing outstanding quality, service, cleanliness and value, so that we make every customer in every restaurant smile. Strategy McDonald’s competitive strategy competes on several bases, including cost, respond, speed, and health issue. Their strongest priority is â€Å"making customers happy†. Product Maturity McDonald’s in is the mature stage of their product life cycle. All the competitors are known and established. This means that they go for more of a cost structure to have a cheap product while still maintaining the MacDonald’s quality. Because the franchise maintains the same product line they can focus on cutting costs. Product Development Process MacDonald’s uses product development teams to gather many minds as a resource for ideas. This allows for the cooks, marketers, service representatives, and others to sit together and think from many different angles to come up with a product. When coming up with a product together, they try to identify potential target markets to penetrate or needs that are not being fulfilled. This is all done in a food studio in Oak Brook, Illinois. They then test the product in a small test market for 6 weeks. And then if successful there they expand the test markets to 800 to 1,000 restaurants. Ethical Performance McDonald considers priorities for food safety, product quality and costs. The facts are together with ethical, environmental and economic responsibilities. Moreover, McDonald had been pushing effort on animal welfare. McDonalds Recognized on worlds most ethical Companies List on 2009. Quality System At McDonald’s, quality is the #1 priority when serving customers. McDonalds delivers quality both through products and services by actively training each employee so that a high standard is set for the food they create. They also purchase their products from high class companies such as their fries from McCain and their drinks from Minute Maid. Process Strategy McDonald’s uses a process focus strategy by developing a system that can be used in every McDonalds you go in to. For example, when entering McDonald’s for a Big Mac meal, one employee takes the order at the counter and gets the drink, another is at the fry machine always making sure fries are made fresh, and a third employee is making the burger. Technology Strategy Along with McDonalds new approach to revamp its physical exterior image much is changing inside the restaurant itself from a technology aspect. Recently McDonalds has introduced WI-FI into many of their outlets providing customers with free access to internet to surf the web or check emails while they enjoy a meal or just a coffee. What McDonalds hopes to achieve with this is to create a more welcoming atmosphere where the food is still fast but the stay is longer and more enjoyable. The internet is one such feature where people can keep in touch while outside of the office without a need for rushing back but also McDonalds has introduced new flat screen televisions which play the local news. These technologic features with cozy leather couches and a new sleek interior look is intended to keep up with the technology changes that go on outside of the restaurant. The building itself is changing as well. McDonalds has introduced a new ventilation system in the building that quickly whisks the kitchen smells such as the burgers and fries outside of the dining room. No longer does the kitchen smell linger into the dining room providing a cleaner and more appealing way to dine within the restaurant. The kitchen is being constantly upgraded for faster and better service and McDonalds is currently looking at installing new grills that will enable them to provide their number one success all day; the breakfast menu.

Air Quality Essay Example for Free

Air Quality Essay 1. Identify and describe the nature of this issue, the spatial and ecological dimension? Air quality is a measure of the amount of pollutants emitted into the atmosphere and the dispersion potential of an area to dilute those pollutants. It is a massive problem of urban living and remains one of the largest environmental concerns. Spatial dimension relates to how air quality differs between places at different times and under different weather patterns. Increasing population and demand for more goods puts greater pressure on air quality. The human population’s interaction with the environment relates to the ecological dimension. In terms of air quality this relates to the impacts of increased gases and particles associated with transportation, industrial activities, smoking, dust storms from over grazing on marginal land, bush fires and the burning fossil fuels. Many of these activities cause increases in carbon monoxide, ozone, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, lead and particles in the atmosphere. People get health problems due to these increases. For example, excessive carbon monoxide levels in the blood stream reduce its ability to transport oxygen. This in turn causes headaches and tiredness. 2. Explain the geographic processes causing the issue Humans are exposed to a number of pollutants , air toxics and particulate matter in the air we breathe and live in. A number of organisations have worked on standards that identify those levels that are safe and those that are not and how these impact on a human’s well being. Pollutants are substances which at high enough levels can cause harm to people and the environment (including plants and animals). Things like sulphur dioxide is from coal, oil burning power stations, mineral ore processing and chemical manufacture. With Sulfur dioxide health issues like the throat and lungs are attacked. People with breathing problems can suffer severe illness . Nitrogen dioxide Is caused from fuel combustion. The throat and lungs are affected with increased levels in the atmosphere. The burning of fossil fuels and motor vehicle emissions increase carbon monoxide levels. Excessive carbon monoxide levels in the blood stream reduce its ability to transport oxygen. This in turn causes headaches and tiredness. Volatile organic compounds are caused by combustion of fuel, motor vehicles and solvent use. With increased levels of VOCs skin irritation, eye irritation and nausea may be caused. It can also be a cancer causing issue. Ozone is formed from nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons in sunny conditions. It is also released by motor vehicles and industry. The tissues of the throat, lungs and eyes may be irritated. Increased lead levels are as a result of exhaust gases from motor vehicles that use leaded petrol, as well as emissions from smelters. In lead it can get into your lungs and go into your blood stream. It can affect you by shutting down your nervous system and the body will stop producing blood and you will die. Motor vehicles, burning of plant materials and bush fires increase levels of particles in the atmosphere. Breathing difficulties and respiratory diseases may worsen. Some particles may contain cancer causing agents. Air toxics are pollutants that are also hazardous to humans. Air toxics are hydrocarbons and heavy metals. They are of high concern when emitted close to the source. Examples include at industrial sites and heavily used roads. There is a connection with high levels of air toxics to cancer, birth defects, genetic damage and respiratory and nervous system disorders. Particles are liquids or solids found in the air. They can be natural substances all those from fuel burning processes. The most damaging particle is known as PM10. This is due to the fact it can stay in the atmosphere for long periods and also be carried large distances is has been known to increase death rates in areas of high concentrations. 3.Outline some contrasting views of different groups involved in the issue? A major issue associated with air quality is related to traffic congestion. Traffic congestion in Sydney has forced roads to go underground in tunnels. Exhaust fumes are then sent above ground via ‘stacks.’ These stacks are of major concern in the areas where they are located, in particular for the health of humans and animals, as well as the environment. The M5 East tunnel, in particular, has had strong feelings from a number of groups. Originally 3 stacks were to be built on high ground to rid the tunnel of fumes. There were many people against this, so only one 35 metre stack was built without a pollution filter. Some contrasting views are summarised below, from a number of groups: Residents against pollution stacks: (RAPS): Protest, court cases, inquiries, petitions and letters have been written to voice concern about pollution, but little has been done. This group believes they are unhealthy, expensive to run and that the government is not caring about the publics health and safety. Minister for roads (state parliament 2006): The Minster believes that the public’s health is not at risk, because of fresh air is put into the tunnels and air quality levels are always met. He believes standards are constantly monitored and that it is well used by motorists. DR Raymond Kearney- associate professor in dept. of Infectious diseases/Immunology: Acess to clean sir is a human need and right. Your lungs me a barrier between the outside world and your body, the tosic substances from the air that is leaving the tunnel and the air that is in side the tunnels reaches your body via the lungs. The burning of petrol, diesel is one of the most toxic sources.

Relationship between life expectancy and various factors

Relationship between life expectancy and various factors Many factors have been proved to be related to the life expectancy of people. This paper examines the relationship between the geographical position people live, their genders, per capita GDP and their life expectancy, using the cross-state data in the United States in 2000. In our research, controlling for per capita income and the gender, we find that the geographical position people live in are strongly correlated how long they can live: life expectancy in Hawaii exceeds that in Southern America by as much as four years. Also, based on our research, the females in the States typically live longer than males by five years. These coefficients are significant. 1 Introduction Academics and medical experts have long been curious about what factors will affect the local life expectancy and health. Academics hold different opinions towards this question. Some scholars, using a cross-country, time-series data on health and income per capita, showed that wealthier countries tend to be healthier (Lant Pritchett and Lawrence H. Summers)  [1]  ; some scholars suggest that particular air pollution may be a potential causes for decrease in life expectancy (Jaakko Nevalainena and Juha Pekkanen)  [2]  ; some scholars have found some diseases correlated with life expectancy, such as Obesity (A. Peeters, J.P. Mackenbach, L. Bonneux)  [3]  . However, previous research does not answer the simple question that when the productivity and per capita income is high enough, what is the effect of per capita income on life expectancy. Also they fail to analyze how people living in different geographical positions with comparable income differ in their life expectancy . This is what this paper will focus on. In this paper, we use the state-level data of 2000 from the U.S. Census Bureau and examine the relationship between life expectancy and various factors, including geographical position, gender and local economic conditions, which are denoted by per capita income. Using an OLS method, we found that the gender and geographical positions strongly correlated with life expectancy. Females in average lives five years longer than males, given other conditions; life expectancy of residents in Hawaii in average is 4 years longer than that of residents in Southern American, including Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, etc. This difference may due to the availability of new medical techniques, the various life styles of different places and the sanitation conditions, which we will not go into the details in this paper. According to our research, the per capita income is not a significant factor affecting the life expectancy across states in the United States, which is contrary to the previous research done by Lant Pritchett and Lawrence H. Summers as mentioned before. Our research shows that in developed countries, the per capita income may not be an important factor in determining the life expectancy, which means the marginal effect of income on life expectancy diminishes. 2 Data and institutional background Life expectancy, by its definition, is the expected (in the statistical sense) number of years of life remaining at a given age  [4]  . The life expectancy in this paper refers to the number of years remaining at birth. Our analysis is based on linked 2000 state-level data from multiple sources. Data on the state-level life expectancy (of female and male) are provided by the U.S. Census Bureau  [5]  , whose mission is to serve as source of data about the United States people and economy  [6]  .Data on the per capita income of all states is from the website of Information Please  [7]  , which is part of Pearson, an integrated education company. The data was computed by Information Please using mid-year population estimates of the Bureau of the Census. To examine the effects of factors other than age and per capita income, we consider the geographical location of people. Intuitively, where people live determines their life style, their diet and the climate around, thus affecting the life expectancy. To figure this effect, we include the geographical location in to our model. However, due to the lack of data, we divide states into 8 groups. They are: Alaska; Hawaii; New England, which includes Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont; Midwest, which includes Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin; West, which includes California, Colorado, Utah, Washington, Wyoming; Middle, which includes Delaware, DC, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania; South, which includes Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North California, South California, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia; Southwest, which includes Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas. We introduce 7 dummy variables to denote these 8 categories. If an observation belongs to a certain category, we denote it with 1, else we set it 0. 3 Methodology Our aim in this paper is to examine the effects of genders, per capita income and geographical location on life expectancy. Among these factors, per capita income is measured by the 2000 US Dollar, while the life expectancy is measured in unite of years. We employ OLS linear regression model to estimate the marginal effect of various factors on life expectancy. Suppose the statistical average years remaining at birth in a certain state is measured by y, and the explanatory variables are vector x. Assume that life expectancy, y is a linear function of our independent variables x, or y=ÃŽÂ ±+xÃŽÂ ²+ÃŽÂ µ, where ÃŽÂ ²is a vector of coefficients andÃŽÂ µis assumed to be conditional independent of x and has a expected value of 0, x is a vector of variables assumed to affect life expectancy. Intuitively, per capita income should have a positive coefficient while the female dummy variable negative. There, using these assumptions and measures, our main hypothesis is as follows. Hypothesis1: an increase in per capita income should be accompanied with an increase in life expectancy. Hypothesis2: being a female means longer life expectancy. Hypothesis3: Living in different part of the United States brings about a different life expectancy. 4 Results 4.1 Descriptive statistics Table 1 provides summary statistics for the main variables in our study. As we can easily figure out from Table 1, the life expectancy of female is much greater than that of males. All the common statistics of females, including mean, maximum, minimum and mean, outperform the males by more than 5 years. Besides, the variation of life expectancy of males among different states, measured by standard deviation, is larger than the females by about half a year. This fact, to some extent, confirms peoples guess that due to more variations in life styles, males life expectancy changes more violently than females. Another fact that we should notice in table 1 is that the great range of per capita income. Ranging from 20856 to 40870, per capita income of different states has a standard deviation of 4512, which accounts for 20% of the mean. Such a great variation suggests that the coefficients may have a relatively small coefficient. Figure 1 is a Box plot of life expectancy for both Male and Female. Visually, we cannot find significant different in variation between these two categories. Most of the observations fall in the right area apart from one observation of male which is significantly below the right area. This observation is the D.C. Since our purpose is to measure the effects of geographical location on life expectancy, we dont have a good reason for deleting this observation from the dataset. As a result, we will keep this sample point and run the regressions. 4.2 Regression results Table 2 provides the regression results for life expectancy, controlling for geographical locations, genders and per capita income. The first set of results in the table use per capita income in 2000, while the second use that of 1999. As we can see from the first column of table 1, using Southwest part of the United States as the base, the dummy variables Hawaii, South, Female are significant under 1% significant level and Middle is significant under 5% significant level. The coefficient of Female is 5.2, which means being a female increases life expectancy by about 5 years, controlling for geographical locations. This accounts for about 7% of life expectancy of males. The difference in life expectancy between male and female may due to their distinct living style. In the United States, men tend to work to support the family, while a large proportion of women remain being a house wife. Higher pressure for men, as well as their more exposure to working place accident, public place crime and unhealthy habit, like smoking and drinking, may contribute to their lower life expectancy. When it comes to geographical location, living in Hawaii is with no doubt better for healthy than in southern American. The difference be tween these two districts may be due to the climate, the living style or some omitted variables, for example, people who like swimming and sailboat may prefer to live in Hawaii. This habit, in turn, makes them healthier than people in other places. Our research has shown that after controlling for per capita income, life expectancy in different parts of the states is different. This suggests a further research on why they differ in life expectancy. When it comes to per capita income, as we can see, in the first column we introduce per capita income of 2000 as explanatory variable, while in the second column we use that of 1999. Neither of these two coefficients is significant, which means in developed countries, income might not be a determinant factor that affects state-level life expectancy. Notice that we are not saying income is not important for individuals who are less fortune, but for statistical average of large sample size, its effects are offsets by the people who are extremely rich. Since it is a cross-sectional dataset, we need to test whether heteroskedasticity exists. Figure 2 are the plot of residuals versus genders. Roughly speaking, the distributions of residuals of both genders seem alike. To confirm this point, we conducted Breusch-Pagan test and the results are presented in Table 3. The chi square is 3.02, which means this is significant under a 10% interval and a weak heteroskedasticity may exist. To exclude this effect, we then conducted weighted OLS regression, and the regression results are similar to that in table1. We present it in table 4. 5 Conclusion In this paper we examine the effects of geographical location on life expectancy, controlling for gender and per capita income. Our research finds that living in different places does contribute to the different in the life expectancy. A more detailed research may be needed to find out why.

My Educational Philosophy :: Philosophy of Education Teaching Teachers Essays

My Educational Philosophy Education is the answer to all of the problems facing the world. Knowledgeable people do not take inhumane and unethical actions against others. It is only through the education of others that crime, poverty and hunger will be solved. It is due to the potential of education that has inspired me to be an educator. The ability to make a difference and to communicate my passion for literature and the English language is my driving force and ambition. Inspiring a disinterested student to read or write poetry is a gateway to creative open minds, which will result in a more civilized world. My classroom will be arranged in a horseshoe. In this way, the students are not separated into clusters and the main focus will always be in the end of the horseshoe. Students will be facing one another and there will be open space for discussion. I want bulletin boards to be changed at least once a month. There will be a calendar focusing on historical events in literature. There will also be a timeline of events on whatever book the students are currently reading. In addition, there will be 10 facts about the author of the month that will appear on an extra-credit quiz. Furthermore, I want 15 different vocabulary words on another bulletin focusing on preparation for the ACT and SAT tests. As much as I would like to establish a non-authoritarian atmosphere, I have only seen it fail. Non-Authoritarian attitudes are often taken advantage of by the students. They use their friendship with the teacher to skip class and not do assignments. Besides, nowadays most parents are too worried about being friends that they do not stress authority either. Kids need to find authority somewhere. Authoritarian attitude is essential for at least the beginning of the year. Each class of students is different; therefore, it is not fair to govern them all the same. Some students will want to learn the material and respect the teacher; however, until the students have proven themselves, I will use an authoritarian rule.

Neurological Memory :: essays research papers

The Human Memory The reason people exist is because of two important things: memory and language, which have been vital in the evolution of humanity. (Our ancestors needed language to explain how to light a fire to keep them warm and a memory to remember how to do it). So we have a memory because if we did not we would never have evolved far enough for you to ask this question in this place. So how does it work? The process involve in the human memory are very complex†¦ I will present you the neuralgic and biologic part then Aurelie will talk about the characteristics of our human memory and then Sebastien will explain the troubles of the memory†¦ Despite big advances in recent years, memory is still a bit of mystery and there are disagreements among the experts about exactly what is going on. But now memory is seen as a function of the brain, and is not placed any more in the heart†¦ It’s defined as the ability to store and retrieve information. Codes of memory The new ways of communication taught us that information could be on different supports: Email, lettre, disc... The memory acts in the same way and info are supported by specific codes: sensorial codes, motor codes and symbolic codes. A special memory exists to each different info: tactual, visual, auditory and olfactory but these codes don’t have the same importance. Visual and auditory codes are the most important codes because they are the primary means of language in the memory. The auditory code is concerned with longer times than the visual one. (You remember longer a sequence of letters if you hear them than if you see them). Olfactory codes are very difficult to study and motor codes are not studied at all. These codes seem to be transitory and the info driven is encoded in the visual way or a linguistic way†¦ That’s why you probably heard about the visual memory and the auditory memory. In the long term memory the info learned becomes more and more abstract with time. The language arrived to a conceptual memory, the visual memory arrived to an analogic memory: visual- spatial but in fact an info is encoded with the two means: verbal and visual (a picture is named). These two codes are very complementary; visual codes are good for global spatial info but bad for a sequential order and verbal codes are good for the order of encode and analyze.

Romaticism and Religion in German Nationalism Essay -- Analysis, Hans

Growing out of the romantic movement of the 19th century, there were many factors and various groups that contributed to the rise of German nationalism. With the nation fragmented, and Europe in social turmoil, the German people were lusting for spiritual and emotional unity that Enlightenment thinking could not provide. The population turned to existing religious groups, romantic thinkers, and secular political religions to fill the emotional gap that existed in a modernizing Europe. In the article, â€Å"Romanticism and the Rise of German Nationalism,† Hans Kohn attempts to show how romanticism developed from a completely artistic movement, into a crucial component in the rise of German nationalism. In the first of five sections, Kohn begins by describing the origins of the romantic movement's opposition toward Enlightenment thinking, and of the French Revolution. He argues that the romantics revered history – namely the middle ages – which was the foundation for the development of the â€Å"national community.† This idealization of history that Kohn argues rejected the current times and had the emotional effect of instilling hope to the people, a point he makes clear when he states, â€Å"The romantic movement began as an artistic revolt against eighteenth-century culture which seemed not to satisfy the soul and not to warm the heart.† (FN, 445). The second section of the article focuses mainly on Novalis, who Kohn calls, â€Å"The first great German romanticist.†(FN, 447) He contends that Novalis wished the state played more of an intimate role in people's lives, but makes clear that this was not a political concept, but poetic.(FN, 448). He elaborates by stating that Novalis did not stress unification on a national basis, but based on the sp... ...an denominations – namely Protestantism. Williamson makes this abundantly clear when he states, â€Å"Indeed, I maintain in this study that the longing for myth is best understood not as a secularization of traditional religion or as a form of 'secular religion,' but rather as a development within Christian (especially German Protestant) culture...†(FN, 4) Williamson takes the time to discuss the reforms within Protestantism and keeps religion central in the study. This is a good study for anyone interested in nineteenth-century German intellectual history, and how religion played such a great role in the development of national ideas. In the midst of great change on the European continent, Germany was left in a position of uncertainty. With the arrival of modernization, the population was looking for order and emotional fulfillment in a fragmented and changing nation.

Consumer Behavior Impacts

Consumer Behavior Impacts Donna Thompson Kaplan University October 3, 2012 Consumer Behavior Impacts Within the context of the consumer socialization of children, adult consumer, and intergenerational socialization reflects home theaters. To measure the cultural impact on consumer behavior towards home entertainment versus theatre has two approaches etic and emic. Etic approaches on cross cultural end user research. While emic focuses upon indulgent issues from the viewpoint of the subjects being studied.All culture influences are not stagnant and do change over time from adults to children behaviors. Within the context of the consumer socialization of children, adult consumer, and intergenerational socialization reflects home theaters that allow for families to enjoy at home in privet, without interruptions entertainment. Also with the economy it saves money, families are going towards more to Netflix than cable they can get movies by mail and watch them at home.Due to these type of services people can comfortably watch movies at home without buying DVD’s, or go to movie theaters. Furthermore â€Å"The term family is a basic concept, it is not easy to define because family composition and structure, as well as the roles played by the family members, are almost always in transition† (Schiffman , L. G. , & Kanuk, L. L. 2007), which leads to cultural methods of measuring, impact and religion. To measure cultural impact on consumer behavior towards home entertainment versus theatre has two approaches etic and emic. Etic units and classifications are available in advance, rather than determined during the analysis. These advanced etic units can be based on prior broad sampling or surveys; emic units must be discovered† (Berry, J. W. 1989). Furthermore, etic approach in cross cultural end user research generally looks at comprehensive or culture free theories and conceptions. To search different socializations variables and constructs that are co nventional to all ultures and can be straightforwardly rivaled in order to discover how the way of life are different or similar to each other as families partake in home theater. Emic focuses upon indulgent issues from the viewpoint of the subjects being studied. Furthermore culture can be defined emic-ally as the lenses during the course of which all occurrences are seen. It determines how these occurrences are apprehended and assimilated. This relates to children looking up to their parents and friends to acquire skills and knowledge to function as consumers or even to build brand loyalty. Understanding the customers' needs and wants induces companies to realize that no two buyers are ever exactly the same, this heterogeneity in needs and wants drive companies to look for distinctive groups of customers† (Shahhosseini A, Ardahaey). Culture influences are not stagnant and do change over time, and at times â€Å"It has been argued that religion is highly personal in nature a nd therefore its effects on consumer behavior depend on individuals’ level of religious commitment or the importance placed on religion in their life† (Mokhlis, S. 009). Thus it is the responsibility of marketing managers to check for any changes and adapt their marketing policies, in view of culture to a great extent establishes how, why, when and for whom merchandises and services are procured. Whether working directly through prohibitions and obligation or through influences on the culture and society, religious values and beliefs are known to affect prescriptively and emblematically human behavior. All culture influences are not stagnant and do change over time from adults to children behaviors.To search different socializations variables and constructs that are conventional to all cultures and can be straightforwardly rivaled in order to discover how the way of life are different or similar to each other as families partake in home theater. It is the responsibility of marketing managers to check for any changes and adapt their marketing policies, in view of culture to a great extent establishes how, why, when and for whom merchandises and services are procured. Reference Berry, J. W. (1989). IMPOSED ETICS-EMICS-DERIVED ETICS: THE OPERATIONALIZATION OF A COMPELLING IDEA.International Journal Of Psychology, 24(6), 721. Mokhlis, S. (2009). Relevancy and Measurement of Religiosity. International Business Research, 2(3), 10. Retrieved from www. ccsenet. org/journal. html Schiffman , L. G. , ; Kanuk, L. L. (2007). Consumer Behavior (9th ed. ). Upper Saddle River, New Jersy: Pearson Education, inc. Shahhosseini A, Ardahaey F. Marketing Mix Practices in the Cultural Industry. International Journal Of Business ; Management. August 2011;6(8):230-234. Available from: Business Source Complete, Ipswich, MA. Accessed October 3, 2012.